To Rice Hull or Not

[Wizz69]

I have an all in one system and read often where brewers use rice hulls to allow a better mesh extraction.

Is this necessary, how much do you add to a recipe?

KR

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[Eric]

Rice hulls evenly spread through the mash will enable mash liquor to flow more freely. Whether that can increase extraction is probably debatable as logic suggests maximum extraction will be obtained when liquor flows uniformly and evenly through the grist.

They will help find a path for liquor to flow though glutenous mashes that may be prone to become stuck.

[mosquat]

I add to every mash but only really depend on them doing their job for a very thick mash like an imperial stout and so on

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[mosquat]

Just to add, I don't expect better extraction only the avoidance of a stuck mash. Which is a PITA

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[nickjdavis]

I use rice hulls in three instances on my Braumeister

1) When I'm mashing with a large proportion of wheat
2) When I have grain bills that are approaching the capacity of my BM malt pipe (so usually anything above 6kg)
3) When I have very small grain bills of around 4-4.5kg....I find that adding 250g of rice hulls actually helps prevent wort fountains that seem to occur with smaller grain bills.

[MashBag]

I have an all in one system and read often where brewers use rice hulls to allow a better mesh extraction.

As above, imo they are only to improve the flow through the mash. If your are spending money on them to improve efficiency, must put a few more grains in?

[MashBag]

3) When I have very small grain bills of around 4-4.5kg....I find that adding 250g of rice hulls actually helps prevent wort fountains that seem to occur with smaller grain bills.

1 & 2 wholly agree.

3 just mod the top plate (with a small seal to stop it moving) and wort fountains are gone forever.

[Wizz69]

Appreciate all your comments and will get some in store for next brew.

Thank you again

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[f00b4r]

I use rice hulls in three instances on my Braumeister

2) When I have grain bills that are approaching the capacity of my BM malt pipe (so usually anything above 6kg)

Nick, do you find that this offsets somewhat the usually efficiency drop off as it nears capacity? I know you keep data on grain bill versus efficiency and am curious as to the reason why it’s done in this case.

[nickjdavis]

3) When I have very small grain bills of around 4-4.5kg....I find that adding 250g of rice hulls actually helps prevent wort fountains that seem to occur with smaller grain bills.

1 & 2 wholly agree.

3 just mod the top plate (with a small seal to stop it moving) and wort fountains are gone forever.

do you mean to stop the top plate moving up and down and fixed in position so that it still compresses the malt?

[nickjdavis]

I use rice hulls in three instances on my Braumeister

2) When I have grain bills that are approaching the capacity of my BM malt pipe (so usually anything above 6kg)

Nick, do you find that this offsets somewhat the usually efficiency drop off as it nears capacity? I know you keep data on grain bill versus efficiency and am curious as to the reason why it’s done in this case.

I dont really know....

1)I haven't been doing it (adding rice hulls) long enough to gather proper data that would allow me to do a valid comparison between old brews and new brews (and to be fair I don't have a huge amount of data relating to old brews 6kg+ malt bills and what efficiencies I achieved in the "non-rice hull era")

2) There are probably other variables that also have an effect on mash extraction efficiency that I cannot factor in that would probably mask the variances due to rice hulls/non rice hulls.

What little data I have (probably 5 brews with hulls and 6 without) on the surface, indicates that there is no benefit whatsoever....but given that every recipe is different in terms of the grist and mash profile....well....see (2) above.

I guess I really need to do some properly controlled brews...six identical recipes, each with say 6.4kg of identical malt, 3 with rice hulls added and three without and see what happens. But that's not going to happen so I will probably proceed in the belief that adding rice hulls certainly wont be harming my efficiency!!!

[f00b4r]

A fair and honest comment Nick. I think I will grab some or oat husks with my next order anyway, they are useful to have around for some beers anyway.